IDG Blog

A Guide to the CIO’s 2019 Tech Priorities

According to the CIO Tech Poll: Tech Priorities 2019 research, 57% of CIOs expect their technology budgets to increase over the next 12 months. This growth is fairly consistent with past years of this study. However, technology priorities are constantly changing based on the tools that organizations have implemented throughout the past year and the current needs of the business. Wondering which technologies IT leaders are planning on adopting throughout the year? Continue reading to find out, along with how emerging vendors can increase their probability of a sale.

Cybersecurity

Not surprisingly, cybersecurity continues to be a top priority for organizations. In 2019, 72% of tech executives expect their spending on cybersecurity to increase, while 25% report it will remain the same. Currently, 63% of organizations have cybersecurity solutions in use – 17% of which are upgrading/ refining their solutions. Of the businesses that don’t have cybersecurity solutions in place, 36% are either researching or piloting their solutions. Additionally, 17% of IT leaders report that cybersecurity is the most important project that their IT team is currently working on – which gives a lot of promise to security vendors today.

Cloud Computing

About two-thirds (67%) of IT leaders expect their cloud computing spending to increase in 2019, which shows that organizations are either investing in new cloud tools or upgrading their current solutions. When we dive deeper, we see that 59% of organizations have cloud solutions in place and an additional 12% are upgrading their solutions. When asked what their single most important IT project is currently, 10% of IT executives said cloud computing.

Business Process Management/Workflow Automation

Business process management/workflow automation is the top technology that IT executives say is their single most important technology project currently (31%). With the increased pressure and desire to become a digital business, this should not be a surprise since a lot of what’s behind successful digital transformation comes from efficiency and automation. Close to two-thirds (63%) of organizations report their spending towards business process management/workflow automation will increase in 2019.

Artificial Intelligence & Machine Learning

Although artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) are not yet widely adopted technologies, these tools are expected play a larger role in 2019. Sixty percent of IT leaders consider AI/ML to be a disruptive technology, meaning that it has potential to significantly alter the way businesses operate, and 47% of IT executives expect their budget allocation to increase towards AI/ML in 2019. Additionally, 54% of IT leaders say that artificial intelligence/machine learning is currently on their radar or being actively researched.

Use of Emerging Tech Vendors

With these new technologies coming into play, tech vendors have some work to do in order to stay top of mind. The good news is that CIOs report that 15% of overall tech budget was spent with new tech companies in 2018, and 41% predict that this percentage will increase in the next 12 months – which is up from 33% in last year’s study. So how do new tech vendors prove their viability and gain business? Tech leaders are looking for case studies/proof of concept, insights into product roadmaps/future plans, and references from past customers. Being in the know on these best practices, along with the technologies and priorities that CIOs have top of mind should put technology vendors in a successful position for the start of 2019.